Job Discussion Forums

GulfProf · Joined: 13 Oct 2007 Posts: 26 Location: Kuwait

I've been happily working at a university in Kuwait for seven years and have recently put out some feelers for a job in the Qatar Foundation campuses. I just had a very good interview for an interesting job.

I'm a single woman who is very self-reliant. I don't need to be entertained all the time which is why I do just fine in Kuwait. But I've kind of outgrown it and am ready for a new challenge. I've been to Doha once a few years ago for the first Tribeca Film Festival. I enjoyed myself a lot that weekend at the film festival and exploring Doha. It looked promising to me.

Can people give me some sense of what life is like for Western expats in Doha? Social life? Entertainment?

Thank you all in advance for any input you might have for me.

veiledsentiments · Joined: 20 Feb 2003 Posts: 17644 Location: USA

Welcome back to the board!!

As I recall from your past posts, one of your beefs with Kuwait was its lifestyle. I would expect that Qatar will be cleaner, but have some of the same issues outside of work. (they are both countries that basically consist of one sprawling city... where after a month, you know nearly every expat in town) You may have found that you exhausted all it has to offer on that one weekend visit. Laughing

Is the employer QU or one of the US branch universities? QU is a mess right now, so I hope it is the second. While many of the jobs out there are good, it is rather out of the way... whereas now you work and live in the middle of what action Kuwait has to offer.

VS

GulfProf · Joined: 13 Oct 2007 Posts: 26 Location: Kuwait

I've decided to pass on the job because after the interview, the job itself doesn't appear to have what I'm looking for. (It's one of the Qatar Foundation branch campuses, BTW....)

I have no illusions that Doha is going to have much more going on than Kuwait but I'm just curious to see if there's anyone out there who has experience with both who might be able to make some comparisons.

I definitely noticed that Doha was a lot cleaner and nicer. But as even the film festival was located in a shopping mall, it doesn't give me much hope that eating out and shopping aren't also the pass times of choice!